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BEDMINSTER, N.J. (Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday identified retired Marine Corps General James Mattis as a strong candidate for U.S. defense secretary, while Mitt Romney, previously a Trump critic, was under serious consideration as secretary of state.

Trump wrote on Twitter that “General James ‘Mad Dog’ Mattis, who is being considered for secretary of defense, was very impressive yesterday. A true General’s General!” Trump met with Mattis, who previously headed the U.S. military’s Central Command, on Saturday in New Jersey.

Trump also met on Saturday with Romney, who is a possible selection as the top U.S. diplomat.

The president-elect told reporters that he would likely have some announcements on top administration positions on Sunday but did not say which ones.

On Sunday, Trump was to meet with several more contenders for senior jobs, including former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who also is in the running for secretary of state, and billionaire investor Wilbur Ross, who is being considered for commerce secretary.

Trump was also scheduled to meet with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who was a close adviser during his campaign but was removed as the head of his transition team.

Speaking on Fox News Sunday, Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who now heads Trump’s transition team,” said Mattis has had “a legendary military career.”

Pence also said Trump and Romney “had a good meeting. It was a warm and a substantive exchange, and I know he is under active consideration to be secretary of state.”

Pence said Romney was willing to be considered for the job.

Trump takes office on Jan. 20 and has working to fill key positions in his administration.

Trump’s incoming White House chief of staff, Reince Priebus, said on ABC’s “This Week” program that Romney and Trump had a “very substantive” conversation in which they discussed foreign hot spots and other issues.

Romney, the unsuccessful 2012 Republican presidential nominee, was a leader of the Republican establishment movement that tried to block Trump from becoming the nominee this year. In March, Romney called Trump “a phony,” “a fraud” and “a con man.”

In another instance of political drama, Pence said he was not offended by pointed comments made to him by a cast member of “Hamilton” after he attended the hit Broadway show.

Trump on Saturday demanded an apology over the comments, but Pence on Sunday declined to ask for one. Pence acknowledged that many Americans were disappointed and anxious after Trump’s Nov. 8 election victory, but he sought to reassure Americans that Trump would be a president “for all Americans.”

After the show, actor Brandon Victor Dixon, who in the play portrays America’s third vice president, Aaron Burr, read a statement directed at Pence while standing in front of the cast in full costume.

“We, sir, we are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children, our parents, or defend us and uphold our inalienable rights,” Dixon said.

Conservative radio talk show host Laura Ingraham confirmed on Sunday she is being considered by Trump to serve as White House press secretary.

“It’s an intriguing idea,” she said on Fox News Sunday.

Ingraham defended the Trump transition team’s decision not to include a pool of reporters when he has traveled at times. She said the news media had been “stacking the deck against Trump” before the election.

(Additional reporting by David Shepardson and Toni Clarke in Washington; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Caren Bohan and Mary Milliken)

With a deranged narcissist in the Oval Office and his lackey controlling the Department of Justice, there is no point in looking to the federal government to curb police violence. Instead, President Donald J. Trump will do everything in his power to encourage it. In the wake of protests over the murder of George Floyd, he has demanded that governors crack down on protestors: "You have to dominate. ... If you don't dominate, you're wasting your time," he told them.

Moreover, most local police authorities are under local control -- mayors, city councils, district attorneys, police chiefs, sheriffs. That's where the accountability for police misconduct begins.

<p>But Congress could take a significant step toward reining in that misconduct by passing a bill to end the practice of allowing the Pentagon to give surplus war equipment to local police departments. There is simply no good reason for police in any city -- from Washington to Wichita -- to roll down the streets in armored personnel carriers, armed with battering rams and grenade launchers. They are not going to war. American citizens are not enemy combatants.</p><p>Several Democrats have already announced their intention to introduce legislation to end the practice. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, has said he would introduce such a measure as an amendment to the all-important annual defense policy bill -- which would give it a decent shot at passing since Republicans are deeply invested in the defense bill.</p><script async="" src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
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</script><p>After protests broke out in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014 following the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by a police officer, local law enforcement authorities took to the streets in armored carriers, further inflaming tensions. They showed little inclination toward restraint or de-escalation. The same thing is occurring in cities around the country right now.</p><p>Off-loading surplus military hardware to local police departments was never a good idea. The practice started back during the 1990s as violent crime peaked and local and federal authorities were feverishly devoted to winning the so-called war on drugs. After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the program ramped up, doling out battlefield gear even to small towns no self-respecting terrorist ever heard of.</p><p>Law enforcement agents became enamored of images of themselves decked out like soldiers on special-ops missions. According to <em>The New York Times</em>, the website of a South Carolina sheriff's department featured its SWAT team "dressed in black with guns drawn, flanking an armored vehicle that looks like a tank and has a mounted .50-caliber gun."</p><p>Poor neighborhoods are subjected to the military-style hardware much more often than affluent ones. And the consequence of that sort of policing is often less safety, not more. When the police behave like an occupying force, the residents return the favor -- treating them with suspicion and contempt. That hardly makes it more likely that police will get the information they need to solve crimes.</p><p>The administration of President Barack Obama understood that and curbed the Pentagon program after Ferguson. In the final years of the Obama administration, the Pentagon reported that local law enforcement agencies had returned 126 tracked armored vehicles, 138 grenade launchers and 1,623 bayonets, the Times said. Pause for a moment just to consider that. Why would any police department -- even New York City's army of 36,000 officers -- need bayonets and grenade launchers? Once you implant in the heads of police officers the notion that they need battlefield gear, their use of violence against unarmed citizens escalates as a natural consequence.</p><script async="" src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
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</script><p>But guess what happened when Trump took office? He removed Obama's restraints on the Pentagon program, once again allowing local law enforcement agents to go to battle against the citizens they are sworn to protect. No surprise there. In 2017, Trump gave a speech in which he urged police officers not to worry about injuring a suspect during an arrest.</p><p>Police violence against black people is a problem as old as the nation itself. It didn't start with Trump's presidency and won't end when it's over. Rather, the racist culture that is embedded among so many law enforcement agencies showed itself clearly when major police unions enthusiastically backed Trump's election. When Trump is finally gone, the campaign to eradicate that culture can begin in earnest.</p>